Discussing Your Salary and Benefits
It's not easy to do. It can create much concern. It can even generate a sense of panic. Sitting down to negotiate your salary and benefits is guaranteed to be a tense time. More than that, the way you handle such a negotiation will make a major difference in your career. It's important to learn how to ask for what you think you really deserve. Yet it's equally important to prepare for such a discussion by thoroughly preparing for the negotiation. You can start by preparing answers to questions such as:
- Do you have a sense of your market worth?
- Have you learned the potential salary range of the job you are applying for?
- Have you factored in the stage of your career?
- Are you ready for the questions the interviewer is likely to ask?
Having a sense of self-worth is the most important thing. This requires that you do your homework, both mentally and emotionally, so that you feel confident. Being fully prepared is the best way to avoid bluster, which can only hurt you in the negotiations.
No. All jobs have a salary range. The hiring manager will probably try to offer you a starting salary at the low end of that range, but there is always room to negotiate.
No. While it's not at all like the expected give-and-take of buying a car, when it comes to setting salaries and benefits, almost everyone considers it a negotiation situation. Thus, it's unusual for someone to accept the first offer from a company.
Everyone brings a number of things to a new job that can affect the salary that's paid. First, of course, is your set of skills. Those skills are amplified if you have some level of experience doing the work that will be expected of you. Then there is your openness to work hours, possible assignments, work locations, and other variables that can affect what a company is willing to pay for your services.
But before these can be assessed and converted into a proposed salary, it's important to pin down the salary range for the job you're considering. If you are just graduating from college, your university career development office will have lots of information on the starting salary ranges for people with various degrees and for different types of career. If you are currently working, it is a good idea to go on at least two job interviews per year, even if you are not looking to change jobs. This is an excellent way to find out whether your skills and experience are valued outside the organization that you work for, allowing you to get a sense of your worth from any salary offers put forth. These are, of course, external measures of worth.
It's also important to have an internal sense of your worth. You should keep up-to-date a list of the strengths, skills, and experiences that you can offer any organization. With this in mind, you will be in a better mental and emotional position to negotiate your salary and benefits.
There are Web sites that have salary calculators, but they're not always reliable since the numbers are predicated on generic job criteria. There are several other ways to discover the pay earned by people doing this kind of job:
- Industry publications—most have an annual report on salaries in the field
- Industry or professional associations—you can use its network of contacts to get an idea of the salary range for this type of job
- Other people who work in a similar position to the one you are looking at—you can dialogue in person or by joining online discussion boards. In some cases, people will share their knowledge of salary ranges for the kind of work they do.
The three basic stages of anyone's career are early, middle, and late. If you are in the early stages of your career, you may be willing to take a lower salary in exchange for the opportunity to work for an exciting and growing company, the chance to learn valuable skills, or to work on a project that is deeply meaningful to you.
If you are in the middle of your career, you may be more interested in benefits such as healthcare and retirement than you are in salary. You also may be asking yourself questions about how much further you want to go in your career and how you want to balance work and family issues.
If you are at a late stage in your career, salary may or may not be that important to you, depending on how well you have been able to prepare for retirement. At this stage, you are focusing more on enjoying your work (and workplace) or on leaving your own personal legacy.
Sooner or later you'll be asked, "What are your salary requirements?" You must be prepared to answer this question. It's not a good idea to fire back a comment like, "Well, what are you offering?" Instead, consider the salary negotiation as an opportunity to demonstrate your professional negotiating skills. It's your first chance to impress the company you may soon be working for.
If you accept the first offer, you may actually convey a lack of self-confidence and an inability to go after what you deserve. If this is your first job, you also should be aware that raises are based on a percentage of current salary; so if you start low, you limit your ability to increase your overall salary over time.
Knowing three things can make you more comfortable in starting a negotiation. First, you should know what the "average" beginner or veteran makes for this kind of work. Second, you should know what would be the least amount (in terms of base salary) that you would accept and still feel adequately paid. Lastly, beyond base salary, you need to be aware of the benefits that you require.
When asked about your salary expectations, you could request that the interviewer share any thoughts he or she has about the existing salary ranges, but be prepared in case you have to be the first to suggest an acceptable range. If so, make sure your lowest range amount is slightly above the minimum that you would accept, and the highest is reasonably more than you really expect them to offer. This high-end amount shouldn't be too outrageous or you will seem out-of-touch with the marketplace. You could also come across as having an inflated view of your worth.
Watch the interviewer's body language closely to assess whether your stated expectations are taken as being reasonable. If the interviewer balks, be prepared to remind him or her of the unique strengths, skills, and experience that you bring to the organization. You could also speak about the results you expect to help them achieve. Remember to keep the focus on your worth to the company, not your cost.
You might receive a final offer during the interview. Ask for a day or two to think about any offer, especially if you have concerns about it. This is not an unusual request, and you have the right to ask for time because accepting a job offer is an important life decision. You also want to avoid appearing overly eager or desperate. If you have honest concerns about the offer, then be sure to state them when you call back; but state these concerns before you give the company your decision. To accept a new job and immediately start to whine is a bad way to begin a new work relationship.
The term "final offer" usually refers to the base salary offer, but there may be room to negotiate for better benefits. If that also seems like a closed door, then ask if you can come up for review within three to six months with the potential for a raise, based on your performance. It's far easier to set a date for a salary review when you start a job rather than having to ask for one after you have been working.
This is a fairly common mistake among young people who are fresh out of full-time education. A visit to a university's career development center can be very helpful for setting realistic expectations and can usually provide concrete information on typical starting salaries. Even if you have been out of school for a while, your alma mater will still be glad to help you with current salary information. It also helps to check out your package expectations with other people in the field before you go in to negotiate. If you appear to have unrealistic expectations about pay, you can seem unrealistic about other workplace matters, and companies are seldom eager to employ a person who is hard to work with.
Be careful. Every job is more than a paycheck. You spend a high percentage of your waking hours at work; if you don't love what you do and care about the organization, it can really affect your overall quality of life. Keep in mind, always, that you're not only negotiating a salary, you're also making a decision about how you will be spending your life—perhaps for years to come.
Gosselin, Thomas B.
Block, Jay A. and Michael Betru.
The Riley Guide: www.rileyguide.com/salguides.html
Salary.com: http://salary.com